Narratives of Child Maltreatment and Child Sexual Abuse in the Canadian Media
This report analyzes Canadian media coverage of child maltreatment and examines the impacts of these narratives on the public’s understanding of this issue.
This report analyzes Canadian media coverage of child maltreatment, and child sexual abuse in particular, and examines the likely impacts of these media narratives on the Albertan public’s understanding of this issue. It finds that the media disseminates four distinct narratives related to child maltreatment. Each of these narratives is missing critical components, however — thus allowing the public to “fill in” these gaps with dominant understandings of child maltreatment. The report concludes with recommendations for reframing strategies that expand and improve media narratives on child maltreatment.